"After the old man and horse had gone, we enjoyed a supper of succulent mountain food. It was nothing so ordinary as carrots and gourd shavings; there were pickled peppers and ginger, boiled greens, and miso soup with some sort of mountain mushrooms.

"The food itself was ordinary, but the woman had prepared it all herself, and of course, it was made tastier by the fact that this lovely woman served it with her own hands. She sat with the wooden tray propped on her knees, her elbows resting on it, her chin in her hands. A smile played across her face as I ate. Meanwhile, the idiot boy had been left to himself on the veranda. Apparently he did not like being alone, for like a cripple he dragged himself into the room where we were seated and plopped himself down beside the woman where he sat cross-legged. The whole time he stared at the tray from which I was eating and pointed at it with his fingers, making whimpering sounds.